And stories shall become legends.

Every time you happen to look up at the night sky when there is a full moon, it’s the universe’s way of giving you a wink. Maybe it says nothing, just giving a tiny nod of acknowledgement to one of its improbable outcomes (you). 

Or maybe it says, “do not worry; just watching, never expecting”. 

but to me, humanity was always defined by our curiosity, our art, our stories and the kindness we are capable of in the face of a danger and fear greater than our own little existence in the universe

the universe did not ask me for permission when it brought me into existence and no question will bring me out of it again now

The universe watches always, sees everything, but judges nothing, and responds never.

"Tell me the truth," the human demanded. The universe rippled, almost like a smile. "I grant you permission to ask any question, and this is what you want to know?" The human glared a little bit. "Tell me. Unless you're breaking your promise," "Of course not," said the universe. It pulled the human closer, made the space around it warm, slowed time into a gentle river. "Well? What's the truth of if all? The one thing that's always true, no matter what?" The universe held its human for a long or short while. Then, it said: "There's no always." "Okay," said the human slowly, "okay, but - " "The only truth is change." For a tiny or an endless while, the human said nothing. When it looked up at the universe, its eyes were shining with tears (maybe happy ones, maybe sad ones; the universe couldn't be sure. Nothing was certain with humans, and how magnificent that was). "So even if - no matter what - " The human couldn't speak anything else. It curled against the universe and held on tight. A pulse of light wove around the human as it dissolved. The universe watched its way back to the stars, back to its home, and whispered a little something after it for when it woke up again. Indeed, my human... you're right. No matter what, even if something and anything happens, change is true, and truth will always come.

Somewhere in the universe, an alien race named the planets of our solar system after the most impressive natural phenomena of their world. They have names that describe the floating jungle in their skies for our Neptune; names that tell of clouds shimmering in colours our own eyes couldn't see for our Venus; they call the moons that orbit us with tender names of plants that aren't quite flowers and not quite corals. Only once have they named a planet differently. Earth had long been their favourite subject to study, to watch, and their children love the stories of its strange and far-away life. The name is impossible to translate for human ears and their limited range, but if I were to try, I would tell you that the aliens call our world Growing Home. Well, they used to. They won't come. They try to forget. They still watch, but the children don't ask anymore. Names have changed rapidly as did hope, and then only a single drone remained circling our orbit, sending infrequent pictures of desert where forests were, of oceans as far as its steel sensors could detect. They sent it to land a few times. The results confirmed all fears. A new drone was sent when the old one succumbed to the heat on its search for where ice used to be. After they found skeletons where their One Day Friends - where we used to live - they didn't sent another drone. And one last time, the name for Earth changed, and Growing Home became Uninhabitable.

to you. to her. to him. to anyone who's afraid of the dark tonight.

Don't be scared that you'll have nothing left. You know, child, the universe used to have nothing and it disliked that so very much that it decided to exist. And to make sure that nothing would ever be nothing again, it said: Above all, there will always be something left.

The universe couldn’t have expanded into a more brilliant world of simple complexity than the one we have, and it’s incredible to just think about it.

Everything we have is so wide that our minds can’t comprehend it. 

An ocean is deeper than we can fathom by multiplying our own body length, how many of us to stack until we touch the dark bottom, how many to span endless water from land to land, we can’t imagine. A brain has more connections than we can take breaths, more impulses than notes we sing or words we could ever speak in three lifetimes. And even a murmuration of starlings encompasses the entire sky over our head, horizon to horizon across the field we stand on to let the rustle of millions of feathers drown out our own blood.

All of it is big and seems different, and then we learn it’s not.

We learn that the shift of water molecules is the electric jolt between neurons is the wing beat of a starling, that all roll like a wave of atoms that make us and the universe, that everything is infinitely complex and so simple.

Our world isn’t complex because its parts are. The single molecule of water, the small neuron, the lone starling - they’re simple.

It’s the chaos and the entropy of the tiniest elements, the infinite possibilities of their touches, that turn order into life and brilliance.

maybe life is just the universe's attempt at understanding itself. it takes hundreds of brains to understand the brain; maybe it also takes billion billion billions of lives and atomic matter and light to as much as reach for the everything of it all.

When Tooru is five years old, he learns that all atoms in the universe once pulsed through the hydrogen-blood of a star, and that every molecule in the world has been weaved together by a kiss from the black sky’s dust. 

When Tooru is twenty-five years old, and he counts the caleidoscope of light dancing through Hajime’s eyes as his lips speak “yes, I will” through a smile of salt, that is when Tooru can finally believe the old tale of how the world was born.